Run … run there … run home …

“I can’t,” I sob. “It’s so far down.”

You have to … run …!

The comforting, rational voice that may be all in my head is right. I have to run. And perhaps home is the safest place for me to be. I look down at my body. My arm and my leg are back. Why am I lying here when I have perfectly good limbs? I push myself onto my knees and immediately my body buckles under the weight. I cry out sharply as my body connects with the glass floor and cracks it. “I told you, I can’t!”

You have to.

Never have I felt so alone. It feels like something has been ripped away, and not just my arm and leg. “Come with me,” I weep. “I need you with me.”

Don’t worry about me. Get out of here!

A horrible bleating noise rips through the silent air. I can feel the high pitch and volume in the wells of my ears, like a loud, deep source of feedback. There it is. The boar. It is far away, miles away, but I know what that shadow in the distance is. Its eyes blaze green like fire. Its fiery bristles quiver in the wind.

“Ah,” the boar moans. Blood and bits of coloured kimono ooze from its mouth onto the checkered floor with every sentence. “Your eyes. He always liked your eyes. I hope they taste like salty caramel things, too. They’ll be a perfect addition to my home.”

Akki. The voice in my head sounds sad. Why are you doing this?

“I have a thousand years to kill. I can do whatever I want!” He stamps his hoof as a stubborn child might stamp their foot. “And you’re supposed to be asleep! Leave me alone, can’t you see I gotta do this?!” The boar lets out a roar of aggravation, of exasperation, of white-hot rage, and charges at me.

What can I do? If I try to get up again I’ll just stumble, and the boar, who is bigger, faster, and stronger will just tower over me, then it will pounce and gore. I could crawl backward on my hands, dragging my sore legs with me, to the edge to throw myself over — if there was one — but the floor stretches out for miles. Now, suddenly, inexplicably, so do I. I do not know what is happening, but I am taking up more squares than I was before. I’m growing, or I’ve grown. Somehow, through all the pain and suffering, I’ve grown.

I won’t be more feast for the boar. I can do something.

I pound at the floor, cracking two more tiles. Success spurs me to punch and hammer through the pain in my good arm, punching even through the wringing feeling in my wrist and the splintering feeling that travels up my now-giant knuckles. The glass cracks like the surface of an icy river.